Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Long Day
I'm out of ideas for today, but I would like to post this photo of some of the essential elements of life:
Tuesday, August 29, 2006
Inspiration
I decided to write about inspiration today because I was experiencing a serious lack of it. I sat down to do my blog entry, and nothing came. Nothing. Just a blank screen. I didn’t even have a topic or theme. After three or four deleted dead-ends, I was back to the blank screen and decided: enough. Time to leave my desk and go out walking. This week, the hot and humid edge of summer is softening, hinting at the moderate perfection of early autumn. It’s ideal walking weather. I was just ten minutes out the door, not even at the most scenic, peaceful part of my route, when I had a moment of inspiration about, well, inspiration.
I am not the kind of writer who waits for inspiration. If I did, I would rarely write. Nearly every page that I have written over the past few weeks for my next deadline (Monday!) has been a slow go. I make progress by consistent effort. The pages accumulate, one paragraph, one piece of dialogue, one scene at a time. Only once or twice have I had real “eureka” moments. If they happen, it is usually when I am out walking. Last fall, after years of struggling to organize the material for my philosophy book, I was plodding along the same tired road that I always take home, when suddenly, I saw the shape of the book, chapter by chapter, fall into place right before my eyes. There was no question in my mind that I had hit it. From the title, to the way the halves would divide up, to the names of each chapter, it was all there. I rushed home, went straight to the computer, typed out the outline, and taped it to the wall right beside my monitor. That was my guidebook. I had only to fill it in. Even with my moment of inspiration, the ideas would not write themselves. After that, it still took months of diligent, daily chipping away at it to get the thing written. During that time, there were few moments where I felt inspired. Instead, there were some days when the writing flowed lightly and easily and other days when it felt agonizing and slow. I logged the hours regardless.
A colleague of mine described his manic experience with his last book. For the majority of his leave, he avoided his work. Then, just a couple of months before the end of the leave, he said he started to feel guilty for having squandered it. One night, an idea came to him, as if from the sky. “Truly inspired,” he said. For the next four weeks, he worked round the clock, snatching bits of sleep here and there, sustaining himself on coffee. He lost twenty pounds. But at the end of it, he had a book. He took a computer diskette out of his pocket and waved it at me. “Here it is,” he said, “All right here.”
That is not my style. If I spend four hours in a day actually writing, that’s a good day. Two hours, and I’m perfectly satisfied. One hour or less will sometimes have to do. I take at least a day off each week, where I don’t do any writing unless I feel irresistibly inspired, which, as I have said, doesn’t happen to me much. I love writing the most when I know that it is not the only thing in life, when it is a choice among others. So, instead of waiting for inspiration, I am most productive when I have other things to do. I got quite a bit done today, for example, despite having a committee meeting. In some ways, the meeting helped me get focused. Tonight we’re going out to dinner with friends. No doubt, that has contributed to my sitting down to write this blog entry. Knowing I can’t do it later, has got me doing it now. No inspiration required.
I am not the kind of writer who waits for inspiration. If I did, I would rarely write. Nearly every page that I have written over the past few weeks for my next deadline (Monday!) has been a slow go. I make progress by consistent effort. The pages accumulate, one paragraph, one piece of dialogue, one scene at a time. Only once or twice have I had real “eureka” moments. If they happen, it is usually when I am out walking. Last fall, after years of struggling to organize the material for my philosophy book, I was plodding along the same tired road that I always take home, when suddenly, I saw the shape of the book, chapter by chapter, fall into place right before my eyes. There was no question in my mind that I had hit it. From the title, to the way the halves would divide up, to the names of each chapter, it was all there. I rushed home, went straight to the computer, typed out the outline, and taped it to the wall right beside my monitor. That was my guidebook. I had only to fill it in. Even with my moment of inspiration, the ideas would not write themselves. After that, it still took months of diligent, daily chipping away at it to get the thing written. During that time, there were few moments where I felt inspired. Instead, there were some days when the writing flowed lightly and easily and other days when it felt agonizing and slow. I logged the hours regardless.
A colleague of mine described his manic experience with his last book. For the majority of his leave, he avoided his work. Then, just a couple of months before the end of the leave, he said he started to feel guilty for having squandered it. One night, an idea came to him, as if from the sky. “Truly inspired,” he said. For the next four weeks, he worked round the clock, snatching bits of sleep here and there, sustaining himself on coffee. He lost twenty pounds. But at the end of it, he had a book. He took a computer diskette out of his pocket and waved it at me. “Here it is,” he said, “All right here.”
That is not my style. If I spend four hours in a day actually writing, that’s a good day. Two hours, and I’m perfectly satisfied. One hour or less will sometimes have to do. I take at least a day off each week, where I don’t do any writing unless I feel irresistibly inspired, which, as I have said, doesn’t happen to me much. I love writing the most when I know that it is not the only thing in life, when it is a choice among others. So, instead of waiting for inspiration, I am most productive when I have other things to do. I got quite a bit done today, for example, despite having a committee meeting. In some ways, the meeting helped me get focused. Tonight we’re going out to dinner with friends. No doubt, that has contributed to my sitting down to write this blog entry. Knowing I can’t do it later, has got me doing it now. No inspiration required.
Sunday, August 27, 2006
Sunday Scribblings #22 My Favourite Monster Movie
This week's Sunday Scribblings prompt is "The Monster..." This got me thinking about movie monsters, which quickly got me to my favourite monster movie, Alien.
Sunday Scribblings #22
My Favourite Monster Movie
I love to be scared but only by things that cannot really happen. The more other-wordly and impossible the creatures, the more delightful my fear. This makes me a big fan of the horror genre in movies. Not horrors like Saw or The Hostel or, most appallingly, Last House on the Left. No. Those things could really happen. There are some sick serial killers out there. Thanks to The Hostel, it is not inconceivable to me that people might pay money to torture and kill other human beings. And Last House on the Left depicts some monstrous human beings doing monstrous and unspeakable things to two teenage girls. So harrowing is the first half of the movie that the scenes of the parents’ revenge could not redeem the film for me. No, I adore movies like Alien (and Aliens), A Nightmare on Elm Street, Poltergeist, The Ring, The Grudge or, most recently, though the comparison to Alien is spurious, The Descent. These movies involve alien creatures, razor-fingered killers who come alive in our dreams, ghosts, and strange cave humanoids. I am not a huge fan of the demonic possession theme, but Rosemary’s Baby and The Exorcist still raise the hairs on the back of my neck.
Among horror films in general, Ridley Scott’s Alien (1979) remains my gold standard. If a credible critic compares a movie to Alien, I’m there. Usually, I am disappointed. Here are ten features of Alien that make it so wonderfully special, so deliciously frightening:
1. Ripley, the hero, played by the then relatively unknown Sigourney Weaver, is female. At the time, that was a welcome and unexpected change.
2.The action is set on a space ship in the far reaches of the universe. There will be no help.
3. We never really get a good look at the alien. We, the viewers, never have more knowledge than the crew, so we get to share their terror. All we/they know that the thing has acid for blood, a telescopic set of very sharp teeth, it sheds, and it is growing rapidly. Whoever said, “the monster you don’t know is scarier than the monster you do know” was bang on. Not knowing exactly what we’re dealing ratchets up the tension, making it almost unbearable.
4. The scene where the alien lurches out of Kane’s chest. A classic.
5. Jonesy, the cat. The cat has a couple of key dramatic moments. Of course, there is the “whew, it’s just the cat” moment, brief though it is. And, just when you think Ripley is home free, “where’s the cat?” She has to go find Jonesy, racing against the unstoppable countdown.
6. Several mini-shockers a long the way—the truth about Ash, for one—but none seem cheap.
7. Brilliant pacing. It starts off slowly, and the pace of the action builds almost undetectably until Ripley is racing through the ship to find the cat and bring it back to the escape pod before the ship self-destructs.
8. The alien isn’t the only villain. Ash and, ultimately, Mother, both stand in Ripley’s way.
9. Even after multiple viewings, it still gets the heart rate way way up.
10. An outer space encounter with an alien is far enough from the realm of possibility that we can sit back, completely suspend belief, and allow the movie to scare the living daylights out of us!
Sunday Scribblings #22
My Favourite Monster Movie
I love to be scared but only by things that cannot really happen. The more other-wordly and impossible the creatures, the more delightful my fear. This makes me a big fan of the horror genre in movies. Not horrors like Saw or The Hostel or, most appallingly, Last House on the Left. No. Those things could really happen. There are some sick serial killers out there. Thanks to The Hostel, it is not inconceivable to me that people might pay money to torture and kill other human beings. And Last House on the Left depicts some monstrous human beings doing monstrous and unspeakable things to two teenage girls. So harrowing is the first half of the movie that the scenes of the parents’ revenge could not redeem the film for me. No, I adore movies like Alien (and Aliens), A Nightmare on Elm Street, Poltergeist, The Ring, The Grudge or, most recently, though the comparison to Alien is spurious, The Descent. These movies involve alien creatures, razor-fingered killers who come alive in our dreams, ghosts, and strange cave humanoids. I am not a huge fan of the demonic possession theme, but Rosemary’s Baby and The Exorcist still raise the hairs on the back of my neck.
Among horror films in general, Ridley Scott’s Alien (1979) remains my gold standard. If a credible critic compares a movie to Alien, I’m there. Usually, I am disappointed. Here are ten features of Alien that make it so wonderfully special, so deliciously frightening:
1. Ripley, the hero, played by the then relatively unknown Sigourney Weaver, is female. At the time, that was a welcome and unexpected change.
2.The action is set on a space ship in the far reaches of the universe. There will be no help.
3. We never really get a good look at the alien. We, the viewers, never have more knowledge than the crew, so we get to share their terror. All we/they know that the thing has acid for blood, a telescopic set of very sharp teeth, it sheds, and it is growing rapidly. Whoever said, “the monster you don’t know is scarier than the monster you do know” was bang on. Not knowing exactly what we’re dealing ratchets up the tension, making it almost unbearable.
4. The scene where the alien lurches out of Kane’s chest. A classic.
5. Jonesy, the cat. The cat has a couple of key dramatic moments. Of course, there is the “whew, it’s just the cat” moment, brief though it is. And, just when you think Ripley is home free, “where’s the cat?” She has to go find Jonesy, racing against the unstoppable countdown.
6. Several mini-shockers a long the way—the truth about Ash, for one—but none seem cheap.
7. Brilliant pacing. It starts off slowly, and the pace of the action builds almost undetectably until Ripley is racing through the ship to find the cat and bring it back to the escape pod before the ship self-destructs.
8. The alien isn’t the only villain. Ash and, ultimately, Mother, both stand in Ripley’s way.
9. Even after multiple viewings, it still gets the heart rate way way up.
10. An outer space encounter with an alien is far enough from the realm of possibility that we can sit back, completely suspend belief, and allow the movie to scare the living daylights out of us!
Friday, August 25, 2006
Comfort Yarn
The general consensus about my "Rejection" entry was that it showed a mature attitude. But there was something that I didn't mention, something that helped me through the sting: The same day the universe offered comfort in the form of a new shipment of yarn from my favourite place to spend money while sitting at my desk: elann.com There are some especially good scores here. That shimmery blue fibre on the top right is 100% hemp. It will become a rambling leaves summer shawl. The dark stuff at the bottom is 20 skeins of dark pure indigo cotton den-m-knit. This is exactly the same thing, made in the very same mill, as Rowan denim. At elann.com, it is only $3.25 a skein. I've been waiting for months for the dark indigo to arrive, and the stock sold out within days (knitters know a good thing when they see it!). The coolest thing about denim yarn is that it is actually denim. When you wash it, it shrinks and fades just like a pair of jeans. Patterns are adjusted accordingly. I've started on the Cargo jacket from Denim People, knit in medium and dark, on addi turbos. The dark will go in the stash for another day. The red yarn is a silk alpaca blend called peruvian baby silk. Not sure what to do with it yet but it will tell me in time. I've also got some pure alpaca that I plan to use for my first lace shawl project, Flower Petal in Italian plum.Yarn and knitting feed my creativity like nothing else. Not that I don't love the fresh clean paper of a new journal, my parker 75 fountain pen (introduced on the market the year I was born), a new bottle of ink...it all nourishes my creative soul. But the texture, colour, and sense of possibility in yarn takes me to different places than pen and paper alone can.
Knitting helps me with my writing. Besides feeding my creativity, it has helped me learn about process versus product. The knitter in me enjoys a work-in-progress more than the final product. I'm having a great time with these socks, which I will be giving away when I'm done with them:
And it is a lot easier to see the sense of possiblity in unknit yarn than in a blank page or computer screen. Can the writer in me can learn to appreciate the journey in the same way? Any creative life needs to be more about taking the small steps every day rather than gazing afar at the destination. I feel a surge of hope whenever I look at this stash of sock yarn. 
Whose happy feet will it ultimately grace? For me, it is essential to have a pair of socks in the works at all time. The hypnotic trance of going round and round and round, the fast and easy sense of progress, the intrigue of seeing the pattern emerge from the self-patterning yarn. I've heard socks have been called the "potato chips" of the knitting world. Before you know it, you've finished a whole sock! And sometimes, before you know it, you've come up with a way to end that story, or figured out what is really driving that character. I want to get as excited by a blank page or an empty screen, a half-finished story, the kernel of truth that needs to sit for a time, as I do by baby alpaca-silk, shimmering hemp, and self-patterning sock-yarn.
Maybe this:
is really not so different from this:
And this:
Or at least that is what I can hope for in time.Thursday, August 24, 2006
Rejection
All writers need to deal with rejection. It’s part of the industry. I am well-prepared for this aspect of the writing life from my academic experience. Take today, for example. This morning I received a polite but decisive rejection from the philosophy editor of a respected academic press of a book manuscript that I have been working on for seven years. Sure, I dragged my heels on it for six. But in the past year I did nothing else but work on this manuscript. I had no other research projects. I did no teaching. I was excused from all committee work. All this so that I could devote 100% of my time and effort to completing this manuscript. And I did. Five short weeks ago I was out celebrating with my husband (who was perhaps even more thrilled than I) at my favourite restaurant because I had sent the manuscript out for review to my first-choice press, who agreed to let me send it to my second-choice press one month later. Last week, it went out again.
For ten days I have enjoyed that light, liberated feeling of getting a piece of work well and truly off my desk. The euphoria of this feeling is directly proportional to how long it has been in your life. After seven years, the experience is…is…there are no words.
Here’s what stings the most about this particular rejection. It was from the one who I sent it to last week! Ouch. I mean, no I don’t want my manuscript tied up for months and months only to be rejected. But surely it deserves longer consideration than a few days. Please, humour me with the happy medium.
One thing I do know from experience is that rejection never feels good. At this point, given loads of first-hand experience, it usually triggers a day or two of insecurity. Like, right now I have NO desire to hear from my first-choice press about the manuscript – just seeing correspondence from that editor could send me into fits. But over the past fifteen years I’ve had a reasonable balance of rejections and acceptances, from which I’ve learned that rejection is not always a reflection of the piece. One of my most well-placed publications was first rejected, without even going out for peer review (the equivalent of what just happened with my manuscript today), by an editor at a far lesser journal than the one in which it ultimately appeared. Sometimes rejections come with constructive comments for improving a piece. Other times the comments are useless and should be pitched. Everything I’ve ever written that I actually feel good about finds a home eventually. It’s just been a matter of finding the right match.
So, Mr. Elitist Press Editor’s opinion notwithstanding, I can still say that I like the book. I wouldn’t have sent it out unless I thought of it as a good, careful, interesting, and relevant piece of philosophical analysis. Whether as a scholarly writer or a creative writer, I want to feel that satisfied with every piece that I send out for consideration. Rejection does not have to undermine my confidence in a piece of work that I believe has merit.
For ten days I have enjoyed that light, liberated feeling of getting a piece of work well and truly off my desk. The euphoria of this feeling is directly proportional to how long it has been in your life. After seven years, the experience is…is…there are no words.
Here’s what stings the most about this particular rejection. It was from the one who I sent it to last week! Ouch. I mean, no I don’t want my manuscript tied up for months and months only to be rejected. But surely it deserves longer consideration than a few days. Please, humour me with the happy medium.
One thing I do know from experience is that rejection never feels good. At this point, given loads of first-hand experience, it usually triggers a day or two of insecurity. Like, right now I have NO desire to hear from my first-choice press about the manuscript – just seeing correspondence from that editor could send me into fits. But over the past fifteen years I’ve had a reasonable balance of rejections and acceptances, from which I’ve learned that rejection is not always a reflection of the piece. One of my most well-placed publications was first rejected, without even going out for peer review (the equivalent of what just happened with my manuscript today), by an editor at a far lesser journal than the one in which it ultimately appeared. Sometimes rejections come with constructive comments for improving a piece. Other times the comments are useless and should be pitched. Everything I’ve ever written that I actually feel good about finds a home eventually. It’s just been a matter of finding the right match.
So, Mr. Elitist Press Editor’s opinion notwithstanding, I can still say that I like the book. I wouldn’t have sent it out unless I thought of it as a good, careful, interesting, and relevant piece of philosophical analysis. Whether as a scholarly writer or a creative writer, I want to feel that satisfied with every piece that I send out for consideration. Rejection does not have to undermine my confidence in a piece of work that I believe has merit.
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
Learning to Love What I Do
Even though I consider myself in transition, I like my current position, even have goals that I wish to meet before I move on. Two years ago I wouldn’t have said this. But then someone pointed me in the direction of a tiny chapter in a book called Zen and the Art of Making a Living by Laurence G. Boldt. The Chapter is entitled “Loving What You Do (‘Til You Are Doing What You Love)”. A couple of years ago, I had quit-fantasies several times a week. Work was agony. Just seeing the title of this little chapter sent me spinning. I didn’t want to read it for fear that I might actually start liking what I do for a living. If I start to like what I do, then I might never make a change. If I start to love it, well, what kind of trap was this guy setting at the end of 600 pages of exciting possibility? The very idea of loving my current employment appalled me. I could not even contemplate doing it until my retirement date (2030!). Inconceivable. Unthinkable. Unacceptable.
“Forget it,” I said. “I will not love my work. I want to write!”
“Just read the chapter,” my friend said.
Here’s what Boldt says: “You will have far more success if you view your new work as something you are working toward, than if you view your old work as something to get away from.” His main idea is that frustration with a career is itself draining. It’s true. A lot of people complain in my (any?) workplace. I don’t enjoy being around those people unless I chime in with my own grievances. And then participating in the ever-expanding list of woes makes me feel doubly put upon and burdened. Boldt says to take that energy-sapping frustration and channel it into “making the greatest contribution you can through your current work.”
He recommends stepping back and seeing what does work in your work. What’s the value in it? How can you make a contribution? This was a useful exercise. First of all, lots of people would say that being a philosophy professor at a research-intensive (read: light teaching load) institution is an enviable gig. When I was an undergraduate, I sure thought this. All those people who keep asking me what I am going to do with my “summer off” sure think this. The friends who like to ask “how many hours a week do you teach?” look positively green when I say “six” or, as it happens this coming semester, “three.” I reflected upon the aspects of the career that I do enjoy and that have value. Contact with the students, for example. I can really make a difference there if I value what I am doing instead of treating it as a burden. Research. I want to be a writer for goodness sake, and writing is a job requirement, a full 40% of what I am paid to do. As I made progress, the little whining voice sometimes jumped in: “Yes, but I want to be a creative writer. Scholarly writing is b-o-r-i-n-g.” Nevertheless, I definitely made headway.
Slowly, slowly, my interest in my work has been re-kindled. I am not dreading September this year. I’m looking forward to my teaching. I have a new research project on the go that excites me. And I am pushing ahead with my MFA in Creative Writing, which I consider to be re-training of the most enjoyable kind. That desperate need to get out of my career has subsided, even though I remain clear in my mind that I will be moving on to other things within the next five to ten years. Boldt is right: “loving what you do will give you the confidence you need to do what you love.”
“Forget it,” I said. “I will not love my work. I want to write!”
“Just read the chapter,” my friend said.
Here’s what Boldt says: “You will have far more success if you view your new work as something you are working toward, than if you view your old work as something to get away from.” His main idea is that frustration with a career is itself draining. It’s true. A lot of people complain in my (any?) workplace. I don’t enjoy being around those people unless I chime in with my own grievances. And then participating in the ever-expanding list of woes makes me feel doubly put upon and burdened. Boldt says to take that energy-sapping frustration and channel it into “making the greatest contribution you can through your current work.”
He recommends stepping back and seeing what does work in your work. What’s the value in it? How can you make a contribution? This was a useful exercise. First of all, lots of people would say that being a philosophy professor at a research-intensive (read: light teaching load) institution is an enviable gig. When I was an undergraduate, I sure thought this. All those people who keep asking me what I am going to do with my “summer off” sure think this. The friends who like to ask “how many hours a week do you teach?” look positively green when I say “six” or, as it happens this coming semester, “three.” I reflected upon the aspects of the career that I do enjoy and that have value. Contact with the students, for example. I can really make a difference there if I value what I am doing instead of treating it as a burden. Research. I want to be a writer for goodness sake, and writing is a job requirement, a full 40% of what I am paid to do. As I made progress, the little whining voice sometimes jumped in: “Yes, but I want to be a creative writer. Scholarly writing is b-o-r-i-n-g.” Nevertheless, I definitely made headway.
Slowly, slowly, my interest in my work has been re-kindled. I am not dreading September this year. I’m looking forward to my teaching. I have a new research project on the go that excites me. And I am pushing ahead with my MFA in Creative Writing, which I consider to be re-training of the most enjoyable kind. That desperate need to get out of my career has subsided, even though I remain clear in my mind that I will be moving on to other things within the next five to ten years. Boldt is right: “loving what you do will give you the confidence you need to do what you love.”
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
Nice Try, Dorothea
I have long been haunted by the words of Dorothea Brande. Her 1934 classic, Becoming a Writer, is a must-read for any aspiring writer. I have read it many times over the years and it never dates. But beware of Chapter Six, “Writing on Schedule.” If you’re with her, she’s already got you doing morning pages by the end of Chapter Five. In Chapter Six you are to take a few minutes in the morning to see what the day has in store. Then you are to commit to a specific time at which you will take 15-30 minutes to write. The length of time is not important. It is the doing, ON SCHEDULE, that is paramount. If you see, for example, that at 4 p.m. you will have 15 free minutes, then “at four o’clock you are going to write, come what may, and you are going to continue until the quarter-hour sounds” (76). There will be no excuses.
Chapter Six ends with a cheerful little subsection called, “Succeed, or Stop Writing.” And these words can bite at my heels whenever I don’t write as planned:
“Right here I should like to sound the solemnest word of warning that you will find in this book: If you fail repeatedly at this exercise, give up writing. Your resistance is actually greater than your desire to write, and you may as well find some other outlet for your energy early as late” (79).
I have spent years questioning whether my resistance is greater than my desire. If it is, then my resistance is immensely powerful because my desire to write is like a fire that won’t go out. I’ve been doing morning pages daily (not a single miss, I must say!) for over three years now. I’ve had bursts of creative energy resulting in stories about which I feel pretty good. But I am less good about keeping that appointment with myself on a consistent basis. I do it for a couple of weeks, and then my mind wanders and the next thing I know…
Since Dorothea is full of ideas about how to outwit the sneaky parts of the unconscious and awaken the sleepy and creative parts of it, I have a theory about her uncharacteristically threatening words at the end of Chapter Six. She’s engaging in a clever ploy. She knows that writers are relentless, defiant beings. Whenever I feel myself slacking away from my creative dream, if the dream itself is not enough to sustain me, Dorothea’s words, taken as a challenge, can spur me on. Dorothea, I’ll show you. See, I can keep an appointment with myself. So there. Watch me. Watch me write now, today, at the time I said I would!
Chapter Six ends with a cheerful little subsection called, “Succeed, or Stop Writing.” And these words can bite at my heels whenever I don’t write as planned:
“Right here I should like to sound the solemnest word of warning that you will find in this book: If you fail repeatedly at this exercise, give up writing. Your resistance is actually greater than your desire to write, and you may as well find some other outlet for your energy early as late” (79).
I have spent years questioning whether my resistance is greater than my desire. If it is, then my resistance is immensely powerful because my desire to write is like a fire that won’t go out. I’ve been doing morning pages daily (not a single miss, I must say!) for over three years now. I’ve had bursts of creative energy resulting in stories about which I feel pretty good. But I am less good about keeping that appointment with myself on a consistent basis. I do it for a couple of weeks, and then my mind wanders and the next thing I know…
Since Dorothea is full of ideas about how to outwit the sneaky parts of the unconscious and awaken the sleepy and creative parts of it, I have a theory about her uncharacteristically threatening words at the end of Chapter Six. She’s engaging in a clever ploy. She knows that writers are relentless, defiant beings. Whenever I feel myself slacking away from my creative dream, if the dream itself is not enough to sustain me, Dorothea’s words, taken as a challenge, can spur me on. Dorothea, I’ll show you. See, I can keep an appointment with myself. So there. Watch me. Watch me write now, today, at the time I said I would!
Where Do I Start?
Day One with the blog. I have been procrastinating about starting a blog for quite some time now. What this must mean, if philosopher John Perry is right, is that until today, there were many less important tasks that kept me from doing this, but RIGHT NOW, there is something so important that in order to avoid it, I had to start my blog. It's called "Structured Procrastination." I am avoiding working on new writing for my second submission for my low residency MFA in Creative Writing. If I want to get that writing done I'm going to have to put something above it on my priority list for tomorrow. Oh, I know: work. The stuff I'm paid to do. If I set out to do that first thing in the morning, that should get me writing. Or at least it will get me knitting.
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